Nepal quake forces ‘living goddess’ to break decades of seclusion

When a massive earthquake struck Nepal in April, the Himalayan nation longest-serving “living goddess” was forced to do the unthinkable — walk the streets for the first time in her life, she said in a rare interview.

Dhana Kumari Bajracharya, the longest reigning Kumari of Nepal, left her quarters in Kathmandu for the first time in three decades as tremors reduced nearby temples to rubble in April

Still following the cloistered lifestyle she entered at the age of two, Dhana Kumari Bajracharya also opened up about her unusually long 30-year reign, suggesting the pain of her unceremonious dethroning in the 1980s was still raw.

Before the 7.8 magnitude April 25 quake, Bajracharya had only ever appeared in public while being carried in an ornate wooden palanquin.

The Himalayan nation’s living goddesses, known as Kumaris, live in seclusion and rarely speak in public, bound by customs that combine elements of Hinduism and Buddhism.Read more